Prince Harry embarked on an extensive media blitz to promote his soon-to-be-released memoir Spare on Sunday with the broadcast of two in-depth interviews that aired on either side of the Atlantic.
In the pre-recorded interviews, the royal sat down with Anderson Cooper for CBS' 60 Minutes and Tom Bradby for the ITV special Harry: The Interview.
The royal revelations made within these interviews have provoked reaction in both the mainstream and social media. The revelations range from the prince discussing his "dangerous" stepmother Camilla's tactics for securing the Queen Consort's crown, to the claim that Meghan Markle never called the royal family racist in the couple's 2021 Oprah interview.
Here, Newsweek rounds up the ten biggest bombshells from Harry's 60 Minutes interview and previously unheard revelations from his discussion with ITV's Bradby.
William Pretended Not To Know Harry at School
One of the main topics Harry discussed with Anderson Cooper on Sunday's special episode of 60 Minutes was the royal's strained relationship with his brother, Prince William.
Harry wanted to dispel the prevalent public idea that Meghan Markle entered his life and caused a breakdown in his close relationship with William, telling Cooper that the pair were never really as close as they appeared.
Cooper questioned Harry about the particularly "cutting" remarks he has made about William in his memoir, including that he found his brother's balding "alarming" and that he has lost his physical resemblance to their mother Princess Diana.
"I don't see it as cutting at all," he responded. "You know, my brother and I love each other. I love him deeply. There has been a lot of pain between the two of us, especially the last six years."
Evidence supplied to illustrate how the pair grew to follow completely separate paths is the revelation that at school William wanted nothing to do with his younger brother, despite Harry's desire to be together.
In Harry's Own Words:
Cooper: "Your brother told you, 'Pretend we don't know each other.'"
Harry: "Yeah, and at the time it hurt. I couldn't make sense of it. I was like, 'What do you mean? We're now at the same school. Like, I haven't seen you for ages, now we get to hang out together.' He's like, 'No, no, no, when we're at school we don't know each other.' And I took that personally. But yes, you're absolutely right, you hit the nail on the head. Like, we had a very similar traumatic experience, and then we—we dealt with it two very different ways."
Stopped From Seeing Graphic Diana Death Scene Photographs
Another large focus of the interview with Cooper was the emotional trauma sustained by Harry following the death of Princess Diana when he was just 12 years old.
The royal described how the then-Prince Charles broke the news to him that his mother had died and how he was only able to cry once, during her burial ceremony.
After years of emotional suppression, the prince describes how he asked a chauffer to drive him through the Pont de l'Alma tunnel in Paris at the same speed his mother's car was driving when it crashed into one of the tunnel's pillars in 1997.
Then he told Cooper that in his 20s he had requested the classified government files relating to his mother's death via a private secretary, which contained photos of her in the moments following the crash.
The secretary, he said, removed the most graphic content, something for which he will always be grateful.
In Harry's Own Words:
"All I saw was the back of my mum's head—slumped on the back seat. There were other more gruesome photographs, but I will be eternally grateful to him [private secretary] for denying me the ability to inflict pain on myself by seeing that. Because that's the kinda stuff that sticks in your mind forever."
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Doubts Over Diana Inquest
In 2008 an official inquest was called to examine the circumstances surrounding Diana's death in an effort to dispel a growing number of conspiracy theories, which in part were being echoed by Mohamed Al-Fayed, the father of Dodi Fayed, the princess' boyfriend who also died in the car crash that claimed her life.
The events were examined in detail and published in a report titled Operation Paget. The inquest found that the princess had been the victim of unlawful killing owing to the "grossly negligent driving" of paparazzi vehicles who were chasing her at the time of the crash and of the driver of the car she was travelling in, Henri Paul, who was over the legal blood alcohol limit at the time of the high speed accident.
In his interview with Cooper, Harry says that he was told the events leading up to Diana's death were like a "bicycle chain," where removing one link would have seen a different end outcome.
He also said he had doubts over the conclusions of the inquest but did not know what benefits reopening the case would have.
In Harry's Own Words:
Harry: "William and I considered reopening the inquest. Because there were so many gaps and so many holes in it. Which just didn't add up and didn't make sense."
Cooper: "Would you still like to do that?"
Harry: "I don't even know if it's an option now. But no, I think… brrrr… would I like to do that now? It's a hell of a question, Anderson."
Cooper: "Do you feel you have the answers that you need to have about what happened to your mom?"
Harry: "Truth be known, no. I don't think I do. And I don't think my brother does either. I don't think the world does. Um…do I need any more than I already know? No. I don't think it would change much."
'Dangerous' Camilla Sacrificed Harry for Positive PR
One member of the royal family who faces the roughest treatment from Harry in both his memoir and interviews is his stepmother Queen Camilla.
Reviled during the breakdown of Charles and Diana's marriage, Camilla's public image has been transformed over the past two decades, so much so that the British public accepted Queen Elizabeth II's announcement in February 2022 that she would be known as "Queen Consort" when Charles acceded to the throne.
Harry insists that part of Camilla's PR turn-around meant that other members of the family were essentially thrown under a bus to achieve this—with him among them.
In Harry's Own Words:
Cooper: "You wrote that she started a campaign in the British press to pave the way for a marriage. And you wrote, 'I even wanted Camilla to be happy. Maybe she'd be less dangerous if she was happy.' How was she dangerous?"
Harry: "Because of the need for her to rehabilitate her image."
Cooper: "That made her dangerous?"
Harry: "That made her dangerous because of the connections that she was forging within the British press. And there was open willingness on both sides to trade of information. And with a family built on hierarchy, and with her, on the way to being Queen consort, there was gonna be people or bodies left in the street because of that."
What Difference Would Giving Up Titles Make?
A key criticism leveled at Harry and Meghan since stepping away from royal life and moving to the U.S. is that despite no longer working with the monarchy and being publicly critical of it's key figures, they continue to use their Duke and Duchess of Sussex titles.
Cooper raised why the royals have chosen not to surrender the titles, to which Harry gave a non-committed answer.
In Harry's Own Words:
Cooper: "Why not renounce your titles as duke and duchess?"
Harry: "And what difference would that make?"
Jeremy Clarkson Helped Prove Point Over Press Attacks on Meghan
Harry made explicit reference to a recent U.K. newspaper controversy during his discussion with Cooper, over an opinion column published in The Sun tabloid newspaper by journalist and broadcaster Jeremy Clarkson in December.
Clarkson wrote of his "dream" of seeing Meghan paraded "naked" through the streets while being shamed and having excrement thrown at her, over claims made in her recent Netflix docuseries.
Clarkson's comments were widely condemned by politicians and celebrities, with The Sun issuing an apology and Clarkson stating that they were a "clumsy" Game of Thrones reference.
Harry said that the violent words proved his and Meghan's point about the British media being toxic.
In Harry's Own Words:
"Did it surprise me? No. Is it shocking? Yes. I mean, thank you for proving our point."
Royals Didn't Invite Harry on Private Flight to Queen's Deathbed
An area of the discussion with Cooper that touched on Harry's most recent interactions with the royal family focussed on his experiences during the time of Queen Elizabeth II's death.
Harry and Meghan were in the U.K. in September 2022 when the queen's health dramatically deteriorated. The prince says he discussed plans to travel to Scotland with Prince William but was later surprised when his family boarded a jet to fly to Aberdeen airport near Balmoral castle, without inviting him.
In Harry's Own Words:
Harry: "I asked my brother—I said, 'What are your plans? How are you and Kate getting up there?' And then, a couple of hours later, you know, all of the family members that live within the Windsor and Ascot area were jumping on a plane together, a plane with 12, 14, maybe 16 seats."
Cooper: "You were not invited on that plane?"
Harry: "I was not invited."
Not Speaking to Charles or William
When asked by Cooper what his relationship with members of the royal family was now, Harry described not having been in contact with either his father King Charles, or his brother Prince William recently.
In Harry's Own Words:
Cooper: "Do you speak to William now? Do you text?"
Harry: "Currently, no. But I look forward to…I look forward to us being able to find peace. I want…"
Cooper: "How long has it been since you spoke?"
Harry: "A while."
Cooper: "Do you speak to your dad?"
Harry: "We aren't—we haven't spoken for quite a while. No, not recently."
Never Said the Royals Were 'Racist'
As well as in the 60 Minutes broadcast, Harry made a number of revelations in his sit-down interview with ITV's Tom Bradby for U.K. viewers, two of the most significant of which concerned race.
When questioned by Bradby about comments made by Meghan during the couple's interview with Oprah Winfrey that inferred a member of the royal family had made insensitive comments about the skin color of the couple's future children, Harry insisted that they never said the comments were racist.
Following the Oprah interview William was asked if his family was racist, to which he offered a rare public denial.
In Harry's Own Words:
Bradby: "A couple of things, [in the book] you talk about accountability, in the Oprah interview you accused members of your family of racism, you don't even..."
Harry: "No I didn't...the British press said that."
Bradby: "Right..."
Harry: "Did Meghan ever mention that they're racist?"
Bradby: "She said there were troubling comments about Archie's skin color."
Harry: "There was concern about his skin color."
Bradby: "Right. Wouldn't you describe that as essentially racist?"
Harry: "I wouldn't, not having lived within that family."
Love For Palace Race Storm Courtier
Another unexpected piece of commentary on race and racism was made by Harry to Bradby relating to a recent incident that saw an elderly courtier make racially insensitive comments to a charity boss.
At a Buckingham Palace event in November, Lady Susan Hussey repeatedly asked charity boss Ngozi Fulani where she was really from despite Fulani telling her she was British.
Fulani took to social media to discuss the interaction that led to Hussey standing down from her household role. Both Fulani and Hussey faced abuse on social media and subsequently met with each other in December at the palace, with Hussey apologizing for the comments and Fulani accepting.
Harry raised the incident, insisting that Hussey is not racist but has "unconscious bias" that is prevalent in palace circles.
In Harry's Own Words:
"All we've [Harry and Meghan] ever asked for in the last...few years is some accountability. And I'm very happy for Ngozi Fulani to be invited into the palace to sit down with Lady Susan Hussey and to reconcile, because Meghan and I love Susan Hussey. She thinks she's great. And I also know that what she meant—she never meant any harm at all but the response from the British press, and from people online because of the stories that they wrote was horrendous. Was absolutely horrendous the response."
James Crawford-Smith is Newsweek's royal reporter based in London. You can find him on Twitter at @jrcrawfordsmith and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.
Do you have a question about King Charles III, William and Kate, Meghan and Harry or their family that you would like our experienced royal correspondents to answer? Email royals@newsweek.com. We'd love to hear from you.